PEA Soup

Patching up a regress argument for intrinsic value

    Proponents of intrinsic value have sometimes attempted to argue for its existence via the following sort of regress argument:

Something is valuable; but if it is valuable, it must be valuable either as a means to something else that is valuable, or else valuable in itself.  If all valuable things were good merely as a means, there must be an infinite chain of instrumental goods extending into the future, without ever leading to any intrinsic good.  Such a chain is impossible.  Therefore, something is intrinsically good.

    Both friends and foes of intrinsic value have found this line of argument problematic.  It is possible, they say, for there to be an infinite chain of merely instrumental goods extending into the future.  This objection gains strength from the obvious parallels between the regress argument and first-cause arguments for the existence of God.  Many philosophers have found it reasonable to reject first-cause arguments for God in light of the possibility of an infinite chain of cause and effect stretching into the past; why, then, should we not reject the regress argument for intrinsic value as well?
    I think a little tinkering can make the regress argument fairly plausible.   I wonder if anyone will agree, and if anyone will think the argument is interesting at all.

Time and Identity

The 2005 Inland Northwest Philosophy Conference is on Time and Identity.  There will be a panel discussion on death featuring Harry Silverstein, Barbara Levenbook and me.   I'll post an update when the program is up.

Watson Conference

I'm happy to report what looks to be a terrific conference coming up this Saturday, February 26, at UC Riverside, on the work of Gary Watson (timed in rough relation to the publication of his book Agency and Answerability).  Follow this link for more details:  http://www.philosophy.ucr.edu/conference/index.html

Peter Unger's Latest Book

In case you haven’t heard yet, Peter Unger, the author of Living High and Letting Die, has put six of the ten chapters of his forthcoming book All the Power in the World on his website.  The book is forthcoming with OUP.

Virtue, lucky and unlucky

In his classic paper "Moral luck," Thomas Nagel claims that Kant denied the relevance of moral luck (i.e., Kant denied that any factor outside an agent's control should determine how we morally appraise an agent or her actions), and that the explanation of Kant's denial is that Kant sought to make virtue possible for everyone.

Moral Phenomenology Workshop

I'm pleased to announce that there will be a moral phenomenology workshop at the University of Arizona this coming November.  See the following link: www.moralphenomenology.com.  Lots of good folks will be there, and it will be exciting to be in on the ground floor of either (a) a new subdiscipline, or (b) the resurrection of an old but too often ignored/overlooked subdiscipline.

Two hot conferences

I just wanted to alert people to two forthcoming  ethics conferences that feature some excellent topics and speakers.